The market: Pipped to the post by Dubai’s big crash

If academic research is anything to go by, Ireland’s crash could end up being the world’s worst ever — it’s nice to know we are the best at something

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t’s almost nice to know we Irish are the best at something. If joint TCD/University of California research in the middle of last year is anything to go by, Ireland’s property crash could end up being the world’s worst ever. That’s ever, ever.

Back in July, the study estimated that Finland’s 1989 crash — when property prices shed 51% from peak to bust over a six-year period — was the worst in the world to date. This month, it seems we are about to fly past that marker.

The Sherry FitzGerald estate agency barometer — in my humble opinion, the one that has proven most consistently accurate over the past two decades — shows that prices in Dublin have now fallen 53% from their peak in 2006, while prices over the rest of the country are down by 48.1%.

Overall, our prices are right back to what they were in quarter three of 2002